Blue Jays' brief rise to .500 also lifts them a few spots in FanSided's power rankings

With 60 games in the books, the Toronto Blue Jays find themselves still under .500 (going into Jun. 2). At 29-31 they are below where they would like to be, but thanks to the subpar league they play in, the Blue Jays are currently a Wild Card team and if the playoffs ended today, they would face off against the New York Yankees in the first round.

While we're miles away from having to figure out playoff matchups, the more recent history shows the Blue Jays are trending in the right direction, but a 15-14 record in May likely isn't going to get them across the finish line. They'll need to be better than over the next few months, starting with tonight's opener of a three game set in Atlanta against the NL East leading Braves (40-20), who just so happen to sport the best record in MLB.

The Blue Jays did get to .500 though this past week, the first time they haven't had more losses than wins since April 4 when they were 4-4. Maybe that is an omen as they were 29-29 on May 29. Unfortunately, the lost the following to games to close out the month, doing so against the division rival Baltimore Orioles.

Regardless, the four wins prior to those two losses helped the Blue Jays move out of the bottom third of the FanSided power rankings this week, climbing from No. 20 to No. 16.

Chris Landers writes, "Two tough losses in Baltimore took the wind out of the sails a bit, but it was still a promising week for those of us who refused to sell our Blue Jays stock just yet. It was also a testament to what this team could yet do it if can finally get healthy – especially in the rotation, which simply ran out of gas by the end of the week with Dylan Cease now on the IL as well. We might just never see the full compliment of talent in Toronto, but they’ve refused to let go of the rope."

Blue Jays starting to make noise - sustaining it will be the key

It's a positive thing for the Blue Jays to start moving up a list like this. They entered the year as the No. 3 overall team, based largely on last years finish as runner ups in the World Series, but they quickly plummeted thanks to a rash of injuries and under performances that was going to be hard to overcome.

While they haven't completely overcome those issues just yet with players like Alejandro Kirk, Addison Barger and Cease currently on the IL, they are getting healthier and are performing better - or at least, picking up wins at a better rate than they did in April. A lot of that was thanks to their pitching, which performed at a 4.5 fWAR during May, tied with the Boston Red Sox for the fourth highest mark in that category.

Their hitters were a combined 3.0 fWAR, ranking 16th in the league. It's not where they want to be, and there is a clear need to see improvements as they also produced a 3.0 fWAR in April, but that was ranked 22nd in the league as other teams have seemingly taken a bit of a step back.

The recognition that the Blue Jays are playing better is a step in the right direction, but there is a lot more work to do to continue climbing the ranks.

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